Date: Tue, 31 Mar 1992 16:51:51 EST
From: Susan Davis <UNLSDB@UBVM.BITNET>
Subject: FYI
For those of you who might find this information on NOTIS Serials of interest.
NOTIS SERIALS SPECIAL INTEREST GROUP
Meeting, Tues. Jan. 28, 1992
San Antonio, Texas
The meeting was called to order by Jean Farrington, co-
chair. She introduced the other co-chair, Donna Alsbury, and the
members of the Steering Committee in attendance: Bill Sozansky,
Susan Davis, and Ruth Christ.
Jean gave a brief report on the experiences of a small group
of SIG members who briefly tested 5.1 serials. Jean, Donna
Alsbury, Margie Axtman and Susan Davis had the opportunity to
"play" with LSER at NOTIS headquarters for a day and a half. The
predictive aspect works very well. The group brought the most
difficult and complex titles to practice with, so a good number
of suggestions and problems were gererated. The SIG is very
pleased that NOTIS invited its representatives to preview the new
module.
Donna presided over the remainder of the meeting, and
introduced Ben Burroughs of the NOTIS Professional Services
Group. This group will be doing training and consulting work,
especially for the new serials module. They are planning
workshops which can be booked by institutions or held regionally.
Their telephone number is (708) 866-4853.
Stuart Miller, NOTIS Marketing, described the current status
of 5.1. It is currently in beta test at Vanderbilt and the
University of Michigan. These sites have already provided lots
of feedback. NOTIS is willing to take more questions regarding
LSER prior to ALA Summer Conference. Donna kindly agreed to
continue to collect them (her BITNET address-FCLDDA@NERVM).
Stuart distributed a handout of the questions collected
prior to this meeting and NOTIS's response (as of today,
subsequent changes are possible). These will be reprinted in
future issues of NOTISes. He indicated that one should feel free
to widely distribute this handout at one's institution.
A few reminders, the new marketing document NOTIS Solutions:
Serials Control is available from NOTIS. The current method of
checking in on the OPR will be supported at least through release
5.1. Security in 5.1 is similar to that in 5.0, online tables
can provide very specific authorizations to staff. The new
release is scheduled for August 1992 (or before NUGM 1992 at the
latest). Some changes are still possible based on the feedback
from the beta sites.
Stuart reviewed selected questions from the handout, then
took questions from the floor. (Again, his answers were based on
current information.)
--"Is there the ability to erase an issue erroneously
received, and reset the prediction?" They are working on this,
there may be a problem resetting the prediction.
--"How can we handle "current issues only" titles? There is
no status of "w" to indicate withdrawn, only bound, missing, or
you can delete the pattern and all its associated receipts."
Stuart recommended starting a new pattern.
--"How can we use LSER for unnumbered series?" Since they
aren't predictable, LSER would not be very appropriate. Continue
to use the OPR.
--"What support is there for the paired fields 853/863?"
MHLD does have tagged fields, in LSER the fields aren't tagged,
but the data is actually in that format.
--"Can we set up OPAC to display holdings from only MHLD, or
some other place?" By using LSYS you can set up where the
holdings display comes from.
--"Can LSER handle compression?" No definite plans for this
now.
--"Will there be a size limitation to the LSER record?"
Practically speaking no, in reality its probably 480 statements.
--"Will the Copy Holdings Record explicity indicate the
presence of an LSER record?" We don't know.
--A comment was made that we will all have to rethink our
workflow to handle title changes.
--"Where do you break your holdings between MHLD/LSER?"
NOTIS recommends you use MHLD to show summary retrospective
holdings up to the point you begin to use LSER, then current
holdings data should come from the new module.
In conclusion, LSER will work for the majority of titles
without much difficulty. NOTIS will look to its users to provide
feedback for the future development of this module.
Donna provided information on the enhancement ballot process
for 1992. A notice will appear over NOTIS-ACQ asking for
suggestions related to acquisitions and serials enhancements.
The deadline will be around the end of May. Then the SIG will
prepare its own ballot for the group, and forward those results
to NOTIS for the consideration in the general enhancement ballot.
This year's voting will be different--each institution will have
20 pts. instead of 50, and be asked to rank up to three items of
overall priority.
NUGM will be held Thur., Oct. 8 (starting at 1 p.m.) and end
at noon Sat., Oct. 10. Post conferences will be held on Sunday.
The following are the program ideas for the Acquisitions/
Serials track:
-5.1 Overview (NOTIS will conduct)
-Interface with accounting systems
-Complex receipts
-Ask the experts
-Binding (from a preservation view)
-Predictive check-in
-MARC Holdings for serials
-Approval plan tape loading
-Government documents in NOTIS
-Joint SIG meeting for Acquisitions/Serials
General questions and discussion followed. Someone in the
audience asked if more information on the testing of LSER could
appear over NOTIS-ACQ, NOTIS-L and other online lists. A
question regarding MHLD elicited the disappointing news that only
two members of the audience had done the conversion, so little
discussion followed. More than one MHLD is possible per
bibliographic record. Export/import capabilities are not a
feature of 5.1, however, Conversion Services would be willing to
write such programs (for a fee). If one is waiting for LSER to
begin checkin, what can be done now to prepare? Since OPRs are
still needed for payment and claiming, those could be created
ahead of time. Bar code scanners which support the SICI and UPC
codes should be purchased.
The meeting was adjourned at 10:25 a.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Susan Davis, Recorder
University at Buffalo
